your face (haunts my once pleasant dreams)
by cyclothimic
Summary: "Come on, girl." / "I bring the noise and the funk wherever I go." / "Come on, girl, you know I look good." / "Skye, is that Powerpuff Girls pajamas?" / "Shit, you're really going with a bang." / "It's okay not to be okay." / "Bottom's up." / "I believe you, alright?" / "I promise." / "I'm not going to leave you alone!"


**i'm an avid skimmons shippper in heart but i also ship tripskye, and fitzskye, and skyelance. i basically ship everyone with skye except coulson and ward. coulson because coulson's practically her father. ward because ward is a creepy asshole. **

**anyway, i cried in the winter finale. seriously, i bawled. and it took me a really long time to come up with this. and i bawled when i wrote this. **

**i hope you'll enjoy it.**

* * *

_If you want to leave_

_I wish that you would just leave_

'_Cause your presence still lingers here_

_And it won't leave me alone_

_-My Immortal, Evanescence_

* * *

Skye didn't know when. She didn't know how. She fell in love with Antoine Triplett somehow. She knew for sure that it wasn't a love at first sight thing. She honestly felt nothing towards him except friendly affections.

But as they took down Garrett, found the Playground, Fitz woke up, Simmons left, those friendly affections turned into not-so-friendly affections. She guessed she'd always find him attractive; him with his neatly trimmed beard and his clean bald head and his blinding smile. Antoine Triplett brought the noise and the funk wherever he went all right.

Once upon a time, Skye was the one who brought light and joy to the team. And yet, since knowing her identity as an 084 and Ward's betrayal and the uprising of Hydra, the light in her had diminished bit by bit.

She cut her hair, got herself bangs.

"Well, someone's going into the field with a bang!" She rolled his eyes at his lame pun.

She held a real gun with real bullets for the first time.

"Shit, you're really going with a bang." Her lips twitched. And then he'd stood behind her, his hands holding hers around the gun as he guided her through the proper stance of shooting.

* * *

She hung out with him the most ever since Simmons left. And she couldn't bring herself to spend more than ten minutes with Fitz in fear that she would burst into tears anytime. So she and Trip would sit next to each other in the break room and drank _Budlight _while watching C-rated horror movies.

Despite how brave she always showed herself to be, there was a little girl in her who was afraid of badly animated zombies and exaggerated spooking. She wondered if part of her falling for him was because of him teasing her while having his arms wrapped around her protectively.

It probably was.

Trip became her partner in the field, however unofficially. Every time she found herself putting on a Kevlar suit and loading a sniper, Trip would be next to her, doing the same thing. And then he would pat her on the back and gave her a thumbs up, giving her that shit eating grin of his.

His irritation with the Koenigs was one of the things she loved about him. She found it annoying initially – still did – but she grew to love it. She loved watching his face grew with irritation and frustration whenever he talked to her about the twins. He'd talked to her about the twins countless times and every time she would rebuke him for it, but secretly, she was slowly looking forward to it.

Until she didn't mind.

* * *

The first time she found herself wanting to kiss him was when she saw him coming down the ramp of the Bus, wearing the General's suit. He was trying to look cool and didn't smile. She was quiet for two seconds because her mind was driving her to leap forward and kiss him. But she didn't. Instead, she found her composure and smirked at him.

"General," she addressed.

His unsmiling lips promptly spread into that grin of his. She was beginning to realize it was a different grin than the one he gave the others. "Come on, girl, you know I look good," he replied.

_Yes, you do, _she thought. She scoffed instead of voicing out that thought. And then she walked off, taking her eyes off him because she wasn't sure what she'd do if she looked at him one more second. He followed closely behind her. Two steps from the car, she felt him put his hand on her back and opened the back door for her. She kept the gasp in and climbed in. He winked at her through the window after closing the door and headed to the other car.

* * *

He stayed with her. Sometimes, she would think that he loved her too; with the way he kept putting his hand on the small of her back, or how he would sometimes kiss her on the top of her head or on her cheek, or the way he would smile at her across the room for no reason.

But she didn't let herself dwell too much on it. She had a lot more on her mind: her identity, the weird carvings Coulson was obsessed with, Ward, Ward's similarly crazy brother, Jemma, Fitz, _her identity_.

May then gave her the portable heart monitor, telling her to practice keeping herself calm as she trained. Her pulse was erratic in the beginning. She asked Trip about how to slow it down, to calm herself. And then he would bring her to the training room himself and teach her.

She succeeded because she made it down to _61 beat per minute_. Not so puny.

But she couldn't keep it to _61 beat per minute_ around the man. It was almost always over 100.

* * *

She may have shown herself to be collected and cool and not even the slightest bit affected when she made her first kill: Donnie Gill. But she wasn't.

She spent the day hacking and shooting and worrying about her stupid best friend, Simmons, out in the enemy properties doing god-knows-what as an undercover agent. And then that night, she claimed exhaustion and bade goodnight to her friends earlier than usual. She tried to sleep, but every time she closed her eyes, she saw herself replaying her pulling the trigger and planting that bullet in that kid's head.

She opened them again and her eyes instantly filled with tears. She scrunched her nose up, as if by doing so would keep them in. She inhaled a loud and shuddering breath, one that almost choked her. She exhaled again, whimpering along the way.

Someone knocked on her door and she turned to stare at it, alarmed. Another five seconds passed before another knock sounded on the wood of her bedroom door. She pushed the covers back and got out of bed. Her feet padded silently on the floor as she made for her door.

When she opened it, Trip was there, his forearm against her door panel and his face painted with worry. Her eyes widened a fraction and she swore her knees almost turned into jelly. Her grip on the door handle tightened.

"Hey, you alright?" he asked.

She swallowed and nodded. "Yeah." She mentally slapped herself for allowing her voice to crack.

He gave her a look and then, without her permission, barged into her room and stretched out on the bed. He patted on the barely there space beside him. "Come on."

She narrowed her eyes at him. "What are you doing?" she asked skeptically. She was _not_ the slightest bit nervous about the fact that the man she'd fallen in love with was literally stretched out on her bed.

He observed her for a moment. It was probably the lighting because she certainly did not see the worry and love in his eyes. He sighed. "I know what it's like," he finally said.

She frowned. "What?"

"To kill someone for the first time."

Her breath hitched and her arms automatically crossed over her chest in a protective gesture. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said.

"Skye," he called softly. Her eyes snapped up to his brown ones. He had a tender look on his face. "It's okay to not be okay."

She pursed her lips, clenched her jaw and fought to not allow the tears to well up again. She inhaled silently but with so much force through her nose as she fought to keep her composure.

"It's okay," he reassured.

The soft inflection in his voice, like he was telling her he would love her no matter what – even though she knew it wasn't true – broke her. She opened her mouth and breathed in gasps, tears started flowing from the edges of her eyes. She rushed towards her bed and clambered to rest by his side, laying her head on his shoulder and burying her face in his shirt, sobbing.

He enclosed his arm around her back good-naturedly, patting her on the small of her back. He hummed a foreign song under his breath and laid his lips to the top of her head – and didn't withdraw.

She fell asleep to his deep voice and his smell.

* * *

She kept her distance from him whenever they weren't on a mission after Jemma's return. Before she started to have feelings for Trip, she knew that he had a crush on the biochemist. And now, as she watched his behavior around Jemma, it was obvious that his crush had not stopped.

She felt bad about it but she couldn't help but be jealous of Jemma. Before her return, she and Trip were always together. They had random dance-off in the lounge room, or idle chat in his or her room, or training together. But now, he spent his time fawning over Jemma.

She sighed and lifted her blanket to cover her face and forced herself to sleep.

* * *

Her father was a monster. She had no doubt of that when she saw the bodies torn apart and lying around the room carelessly.

And yet, she found herself sliding the photo of baby her in her father's arms into the hidden compartment of her Kevlar. She went back to the Playground, gave a field report and reassured Jemma that she was okay when the biochemist asked.

Then she disappeared into the training room and got a gun and began shooting at targets. When bullets ran out, she would reload it and started shooting. It became a routine for the next hour. It was comforting to imagine Ward's face on the targets and to shoot holes into that despicable face again and again and again and _again. _And to not think about her monstrous father.

Someone sidled up next to her when she was reloading another round of bullets. She couldn't see him or hear him but she knew that it was him. She didn't even have time to protest him for taking off her earmuffs because he had shoved the photo in her face the instant she turned around.

She looked at it in surprise for a second before she snatched it off his hand, slamming it on the table, next to the gun.

"Where did you get this?" she snapped, staring down at it.

"Found this in your Kevlar," he said easily.

She frowned. "How? It was in a h-"

"A hidden compartment," he finished for her. She swung around, glaring at him. He smirked but he still looked concerned. "I've been your partner for months, Skye. You think I wouldn't know about hidden compartments in your Kevlar?"

"That doesn't mean you have the right to look into it. It's a hidden compartment for a reason."

"I was worried."

"Well, don't," she retorted. "I'm fine." She put on the earmuffs and glasses. She was starting to pull up another target when he lifted the earmuffs again. "What do you want?" she barked angrily, irritated at his persistence.

He took a breath and grasped her elbow, pulling her out of the room. She struggled against him but he was still a more experienced agent than she was and he was stronger. He deposited her at the bar and went behind it.

"What the hell are you doing?"

He mixed a drink and put it in front of her. Whiskey on the rocks. Her favorite. "Bottom's up," he announced.

She gave him an incredulous look. "What?"

"I am going to have a drink with you and you are going to pour all your heart's torment for the day to Papa Antoine," he quipped and mixed himself a drink.

She reluctantly lifted hers and clinked it to his. "Papa Antoine?" she remarked dryly after drinking it.

He smirked. "It's nice, isn't it?"

She scoffed.

* * *

Distraction and heavy crisis came in the form of Grant Ward's disappearance. Skye had cursed multiple times as she hacked through the satellite mainframe and had security camera footages of the States all over the big screens, running facial recognition software.

She almost protested when Coulson decided to send Trip in to the bus station after her laptop beeped in alert. She breathed in relief when he decided to send in Hunter and Bobbi as well.

She didn't stop herself as she practically threw herself at Trip when he came back safe and sound. He had laughed and lifted her off her feet, hugging tightly and spinning her around.

"I'm okay," he reassured her after putting her back down, patting her on the shoulder and went into the lab, looking for Jemma.

* * *

Skye crept out from the briefing room upstairs and sat down on the stairs, careful not to let the metal creak. When she was sure Fitz didn't notice her, she put her chin on her palm, propped her elbow on her knee and watched him assemble the device again and again.

In the beginning, she was surprised and a little scared when Coulson asked Fitz to join them on this venture. She was scared _of_ Fitz. She could never be scared of one of her best friends in her whole life.

She was scared _for_ Fitz. After all, the last time he was in the field he got locked in a box with his best friend and practically got ejected out of the Bus by her psychotic ex-whatever-Ward-was. And now he was back in said Bus. Fitz didn't express it, but she could see it. When the timer beeped and he slammed on it and then he would sigh in desperation and look around him, oblivious to her presence.

She wanted so much to approach him and reassure him that Garrett and Ward weren't here and they couldn't hurt him anymore. She wouldn't let them. But she didn't, in fear that she would do more harm than good by barging into his personal space suddenly.

She didn't have much time to observe Fitz because they touched down eventually. She pretended she hadn't been sitting there quietly waiting for him to explode as she stood up from the step she was sitting on and approached him with Trip suddenly beside her.

And then Coulson handed them miniature objects like watches that would kill a man's junk or something and leak juice. And she didn't have any more time to think about Fitz and how long had Trip been sitting on the stairs behind her just now.

* * *

She officially resented her father to the core. She was worried enough as it was when she suddenly lost contact with them and then one hour later she had to watch them come up the ramp carrying an unconscious Trip. She blinked the panic back and called for the paramedics to take Trip up so they could fix him up.

Before she could ask what happened, Coulson and Fitz had pulled her into the briefing room and made her run scans and interrupting her whenever she was about to ask questions. She knew that something big had happened when Fitz interrupted her for the fifth time in a row.

She stopped typing and looked from Fitz to Coulson.

"They're patching Trip up and he's gonna be fine." She had to say that. She had to believe that. "But you're acting like you saw the devil out there."

"I think I did," Fitz said after about ten minutes of heavy silence.

* * *

She sneaked into Fitz's room that night.

"You can't tell Trip about my father," she whispered, practically begged.

Fitz, without hesitation, nodded his agreement and surprised her by pulling her into a hug.

* * *

After that nightmare, she knew. She just _knew_ that something was going to happen despite Coulson and May and practically the entire team's dismissal of her concerns. She was nearly tearing her hair out when Trip pulled her to one side and had one of his hands gently kneading the back of her neck while the other was on her arm.

"Don't worry. We're gonna be okay," Trip assured her.

She shook her hand and carded her shaking hand through her hair. "No, you're not. None of this is okay. It's _not _okay."

"Hey," he said softly. "I believe you, alright?" She stared up at him in surprise and he smiled. "And I promise I'm gonna do my best to keep everyone safe. I _promise_."

"I'm gonna be really pissed if none of you comes back alive," she whispered.

He chuckled and nodded. "Alright." He looked like he was about to say something and she kept wishing he would say the three words she wanted to hear. But then he stopped himself and kissed her on the top of her head as usual before leaving.

* * *

This was not how she imagined her first meeting with her own father would go down. She'd always imagined him sitting in a restaurant, alone, and she would by chance recognize him as her father despite having never seen him. And then there would be awkward interaction for the first couple times but then they would grow familiar with each other.

But no, things in her life could never go her way. She had to be kidnapped by Grant fucking Ward and dragged down some stupid museum into a secret room to meet her disheveled father. She could barely remember what happened except the song he kept humming.

Everything basically went to shit and she killed yet another person – this time with the Diviner, as her father had called it. Cal. (Later, she would discover through the databases that he was Calvin Zabo.) And then Whitehall had her and Ward tied to chairs in an abandoned kitchen and she swore Ward was going to talk her head off until he came to untie her from her chair.

But she still hated him to the guts and held no remorse when she shot a few times before leaving. She couldn't help but smile a little when she saw the look on his face.

She ran around the place, shooting at Whitehall's men while looking for her real father and her substitute father who had been more of a father to her than her real father. And she found them, wrestling each other, each with bloodied faces. She could see Coulson losing.

"Dad!" she shouted.

Cal then stopped and he looked at her with that smile she saw in the fading photo she still kept in her room. She could see that he really did love her. Only he wasn't the father she'd been wanting. She couldn't bring herself to love him back.

"I will always love you, Daisy."

Skye had gasped and in the next millisecond he had put a bullet in his own head. Skye didn't even have time to process that when Coulson called her name. And then guilt started to eat at her at a rapid pace when she saw his devastated condition lying on the ground. So she sobbed her apology and decided that she was bringing too much risk into everyone's life and she promised she would fix it.

As she ran towards the hole where she could enter the underground city they'd been talking about, she silently apologized to everyone, especially Trip.

Seeing Mack with his blackened eyes had more than intensified the guilt and desperation in her. She _had _to fix this.

She had to admit when the walls started closing in around her and Raina, she was prepared. At least this way, whatever was going to happen here was only going to happen to the two of them. And she didn't like Raina very much as a person.

She thought they were safe. She was _certain_ they were safe. And then Trip with his goddamn hero complex had to slip in at the last second, out of breath and exhausted.

"What are you doing here?" she had exclaimed.

"I'm not going to leave you alone!" he'd shouted.

And then their eyes locked and it dawned on her. She gaped at him for a second and she was about to say the words when the ground started shaking.

* * *

Skye was inconsolable. When she regained mobility and she realized what she was doing, she was practically shell-shocked and awe. Then she remembered Trip and she turned to show him and she saw him, frozen in rock and crumbling away as the earth shook violently.

She was doing that. Her throat dried straightaway and she could only watch as he crumbled away. The ground stopped shaking when the last piece of him dropped to the ground, creating a loud clatter.

She dropped to her knees and wailed. She was screaming, pleading for Trip to come back and to take her away instead.

The walls hissed, sliding open and Coulson and Mack came rushing in. She barely gave them any notice because Trip was gone and she was still here and what was the _point_.

* * *

When she woke up – apparently Coulson had sedated her – Jemma was looming over her with a worried face. She looked up at the woman as Jemma gently brushed her hair back with a sad look clouding her expression.

Skye remembered everything that had happened and the look on Jemma's face had basically confirmed that it was all real. None of it was a dream. Trip was gone.

Her heart felt like it was being squeezed dry into a dry, feeling-void organ. She closed her eyes as a drop of tear slipped out of the edge of her eye.

* * *

The alarms that she'd asked Fitz to create to her modifications sounded as soon as she felt _it_ in her fingertips.

"Skye, there's no need –"

"Just do it," she'd interjected him with a broken whisper. They'd stared at each other for a few seconds before Fitz sighed and relented. "Thank you." And then she'd left to do more target practice.

Now, she swore to herself that she was going to go all smug up in Fitz's face when this was over – _if _this was over. And then it tore through her, vibrating through her and she felt the stabbing ache in her head. She slumped against the wall as people all around her ran towards the exit.

She clenched her fists and laid back against the wall, feeling as powerless as she could get. The ground started shaking again.

Once upon a time, in her wholesome naiveté, she would have been a proud little shit and she might have learned to control it with that mindset. But now, knowing how fatal her powers could be, she couldn't control it. She knew she was allowing the panic and the fear and the painful memories controlling her, making her spiral. But she didn't know how to stop it.

Someone grabbed her face with two hands and she snapped her eyes open in panic to see Jemma kneeling in front of her and Fitz next to her. She frowned and swatted their hands away.

"What are you two doing? _Get out_!" she shouted, pushing them but she had no energy left to push.

Jemma had easily pinned her hands down to her sides and stared at her offended. "We are not leaving!"

"I can't control it! You need to get out!"

"Skye, stop!" Fitz. "We're not leaving and that's the end of it."

"Yes, Skye, you need to calm down, okay?"

She gave Jemma a look. "I _can't_. Can't you see? I can't! And that's why you should leave. I can't lose any one of you again!"

"Well, we can't lose you too!" Jemma cried. No, she was literally crying. But Jemma rapidly blinked her tears away. "Calm down, Skye. You can do it."

"I can't!" Skye cried out as she struggled as their hold. "Fitz, get her out of here!"

Fitz frowned at her and shook his head. "Over my dead freaking body."

"If you stay here, you _are _gonna be a dead body!" she yelled, as the images of a frozen Trip crumbling into pieces flashed in her mind.

Jemma was starting to look helpless. Good, maybe then she would get it and they would freaking leave before she killed them. "Skye," Jemma said. Skye groaned. "Skye," Jemma repeated, "imagine me as Trip." Skye looked at her, shocked. "Come on, Skye, look into my eyes. Think about Trip. You can do it. Come on."

Skye consented and looked into Jemma's light green eyes. Slowly, her eyes began to turn into the warm brown ones that once belonged to one Antoine Triplett.

"_Come on, girl."_

"_I bring the noise and the funk wherever I go."_

"_Come on, girl, you know I look good."_

"_Skye, is that Powerpuff Girls pajamas?"_

"_Shit, you're really going with a bang."_

"_It's okay not to be okay."_

"_Bottom's up."_

"_I believe you, alright?"_

"_I __**promise**__."_

"_I'm not going to leave you alone!"_

Slowly, gradually, miraculously, somehow, the ground stopped shaking. And Jemma was Jemma again.

* * *

During the days leading up to New Year's Eve, she'd isolated herself in Vault D despite the team's protests. Jemma or Fitz or sometimes both of them or sometimes Hunter or May or Coulson would bring three meals to her every day without fail as she practiced to control her powers, using Trip's voice to anchor her.

She would force them to re-enable the force field after they'd put down the tray. They wouldn't leave though. They would sit on the chair and on the other side of the force field and have idle chat with her for an hour. Well, except May. May would just sit there in silence to accompany her as she ate and then continue to practice her control on her powers. Only then would they leave with a regretful look on their faces.

Each time the ground would shake – the vibrations less violent as time progressed – she would apologize to them whenever they came down. And they would shake their hands in dismissal and smile.

On the morning of New Year's Eve, May and Coulson came down, this time without a tray. They disabled the force field.

"You're coming up with us and you're gonna have a proper breakfast with us and then lunch and then dinner and I'm gonna prohibit you from entering the vault anymore," Coulson rattled off, smiling as he said it.

May neared her and grabbed her elbow and practically pulled her up the stairs. She watched as Coulson locked the door to the vault.

"You know I can hack in here anytime I want, right?" Skye quipped.

Coulson groaned. "Please don't," he pleaded quietly.

Jemma laughed when she saw Skye sitting at the table and ran towards her to hug her. And then Fitz greeted her good morning with a really wide smile and hugged her as well. Hunter teased her about finally coming out of her isolation period and joining the human world once again.

They laughed and cheered and talked as if nothing had happened. But they all knew an essential piece was missing.

Skye took a nap in her room for an hour. When she woke up, she decided to walk around and see the things she hadn't seen for days. Each room she entered, she would be assaulted with memories of her and Trip having fun. The ache had gone into a numbing agony and she found herself smiling in occasions.

She had dinner with them again and denied their offer of hanging out in the lounge room to count down the seconds leading up to New Year. They'd nodded understandingly. She grabbed two bottles of beer from the fridge and excused herself from the dining room.

She found herself standing in front of _his_ room and blinked. Her fingers wrapped around the doorknob but she didn't open it. A small frown marred her forehead and she took a shuddering breath before she opened it, stepped inside and closed the door behind her.

She looked around. It had been untouched. Coulson hadn't ordered anyone to clean up the room. A gasp escaped her lips when she saw framed photos of her and Trip all over the room. Her eyes started welling up. She sat down on the floor with her back against the bed and took a frame in her hand.

She smiled as she cried. It was their first target training together. They were back to back, each carrying a weapon of their choice and feigning cool.

She didn't know how long she'd been in his room, looking from one photo to another, drinking her beer. The door opened and Jemma peeked her head in. The biochemist smiled and stepped in, shutting the door behind her.

"Figured I'd find you here."

Skye grinned. She didn't even bother drying her eyes. "Yeah?"

Jemma hummed with a nod and sat beside her, a beer in her own hand. She joined Skye in staring at the photo in her hand. "He loved you too," Jemma whispered after some moments of extreme silence where they only spent staring at more photos.

Skye looked to her. "Too?"

Jemma chuckled and put a hand on Skye's knee. "I figured it out when I heard Coulson retelling what he saw when he found you in the cave."

"Wow," Skye said dryly.

"I felt so bad for Trip." Skye frowned. "You know, when I came back and he kept looking for me?" Skye nodded. "He was asking for advice."

"Advice?" Skye echoed in confusion.

"He wasn't sure if you loved him and I wasn't sure if you loved him. So eventually, he stopped asking for advice and started telling me about the things he did with you that day and so on."

Skye's heart beat violently against her chest. She wrapped her arms around her knees and curled herself into a ball. "Oh god," she choked.

"I'm sure when he went into the cave, he knew what he was getting into. And he had no regrets." Skye breathed harshly against the material of jeans. "You'll be okay, Skye," Jemma whispered as she wrapped herself around Skye.

A few seconds later, Jemma took the liberty to leave her alone, knowing she needed it.

Skye lifted her head and grabbed the photo she'd discarded earlier. She stared at their grinning faces and grinned herself. She then kissed Trip's face in the photo.

"I love you," she whispered.

_10._

She uncapped the second bottle of beer.

_9._

"_Ward's an ass."_

"_Girl, let's pin his face on the targets and shoot them."_

_8._

"_Want some chips?"_

"_I thought you don't snack."_

"_Anything for my girl."_

_7._

"_I know what it's like. To kill someone for the first time."_

_6._

"_You're gonna be okay."_

_5._

"_I think despite how much of a monster you perceive your father to be, he still loves you."_

_4._

"_How do you know that?"_

_3._

"_Because I am Papa Antoine."_

_2._

"_No matter what, I'll be right by you, Skye."_

_1._

She drank from the bottle and raised it in the empty, dank air.

"Happy New Year, Trip," she whispered.

She was probably too drunk but she thought she could see him coming in through his door with a shit eating grin on his devastatingly handsome face.

"_Happy New Year, Skye!" _he cheered.

* * *

**i couldn't help it.**


End file.
